Not sure what the general opinion of HP is but my DV5 (bought Nov 08) series Pavilion seems great to me, looks swish with great build quality, however they didn't half mess up the Windows installation with pre-installed crap. (I put my own Vista install on it using the serial on the laptop base)
Definitely look into HP anyway, I bought mine in the US and the specs were excellent for the price. (although partly due to how much cheaper things are there)
My old laptop was a Pavilion. My only complaint with it was that it tended to overheat quite easily. I've heard that HPs still suffer from this. Has that been your experience with them?
Which model DV5 are you using? I've come across a HP DV5-1010 for £520 (refurb) that looks interesting:
Intel Core 2 Duo (P7350) 2 GHz 1066 MHz 3 MB, RAM 4096 MB, 250 GB SATA, Windows Vista Home Premium, GeForce 9600M GT 512 MB, Blu Ray + remote control.
Does that sound like a good deal to you? It's described as having slight cosmetic imperfections (Grade 2 refurb), which doesn't really bother me so long as the machine's performance isn't effected.
Also seen a DV7 refurb for £650 (DV71020EA):
INTEL CORE 2 DUO (P8400) 2.26 GHz, 4GB RAM, 320GB SATA, GeForce 9600M GT 512MB, Blu Ray
Do you think that's worth the extra £130? The larger screen and faster processor are certainly appealing.
